Forum attitudes lately

[devonwoody]

I would like to bring to the attention of the moderators and others a situation that is arising imho on the forum lately.

This morning I received a personal email saying that its writer was not posting or visiting the forum in the near future. This was intimated because other forum members are posting very abrupt replies and provocative responses to others postings.

I sympathised with his mail and asked that he remain and post in his normal way because without the membership remaining stable it would come perhaps to a situation where only the bolshie responding members were left if all followed his example.

The forum would then be a less friendly and informative place to visit.

Please treat this posting in a friendly manner and not give me too much stick.

 

[xy mosian]

I fully agree with what I think is your underlying point.

Personally I was brought up with " If you can't think of anything nice/good to say, say nowt ". This seems to work .. for me at least.

xy

 

[laird]

No stick from me. I've also noticed a lot of uneccessary (IMVHO) snipes and snarls recently.

 

[Ironballs]

I agree DW and you may have seen I posted a suggestion in the improvements area. Some positive response and some degenerating into drivel.

I can only assume it's a bit of cabin fever after everyone has been cooped up during a long hard winter. There's a good episode of Northern Exposure from the 1st series where they all kept picking fights with each other at the end of the winter. They cured it by having a nude run down the street at the beginning of spring, not sure that would work here!

 

[studders]

I agree DW. I think some of the attitudes the Forum has adopted recently leave a lot to be desired.
Someone should take the Forum to one side and give it a Jolly Good Talking to.
It really is unacceptable.

 

[newt]

I agree some replies have been quite worrying, I can only assume that the recession and the cold winter is having its effect on folk.

 

[TrimTheKing]

There has been a real noticeable decline in the content and context of a lot of posts recently and it's a real shame.

I joined this forum in 2007 and from the off was massively impressed with the overall friendliness of the place compared to other 'younger' forums I frequented. Just recently, I would say over the past 6 months, I have really noticed the kind of behaviours that made me leave other forums starting to creep in.

I'm not some kind of super sensitive tree hugger, this is more about actually having an interest in what people are getting up to, how they do it and broadening my woodworking horizons and having a finite amount of free time. I don't therefore want to have to spend that time trawling through pages of sniping, sarcasm and 'my way is right, anything else and you're a d!ck' kind of bullsh!t.

It's a real shame as we have seen a good number of extremely knowledgable posters disappear in the time since I joined, and from what I can tell most of these have been because of puerile comments escalating. It's a real shame.

Just my 2p's worth.

 

[matt]

It's just human interaction as far I can tell, albeit forums are like driving where everyone is in their own little bubble being "right" and faultless. The cold weather and absence of much else going on leads to posts that are started to express an opinion and/or gripes rather than problems that need solving.

I can't say I'm overly worried about it though, even if some members are taking some time out - the latter is probably quite a healthy thing to do and really not the end of the world. This is just a forum.

 

[Dibs-h]

I think on the whole the forum went and does go quite well. Except we now seem to have trigger happy Mods, who just can't help themselves!

 

[mr grimsdale]

TBH threads like this one can put people off - all that low level wittering and griping.
Talk about woodwork instead!

PS the thing that will most put (grown-up) people off on this forum is the arbitrary deletion and locking of threads. Like being back in junior school!

 

[wizer]

As I said in another thread recently, even I have decided to distance myself from the forum a little. These things come and go. As proved today, we have an underlying body of strong relationships which hold this forum together. I just hope this current spell doesn't cause more valuable members to leave. I'm not going to blame the moderators for what's happening, but I do think the man at the top needs to get involved. Only he can call order IMHO.

 

[Walter Hall]

I joined this forum when another forum was going through a similar patch with one or two individuals causing unnecessary unpleasantness. Those issues are now resolved and although I have in the main returned to frequent that other forum I still post here occasionally and am saddened to see this kind of behaviour here.

 

[wizer]

I joined this forum when another forum was going through a similar patch with one or two individuals causing unnecessary unpleasantness. Those issues are now resolved and although I have in the main returned to frequent that other forum I still post here occasionally and am saddened to see this kind of behaviour here.

I've been here for five years and at a guess I'd say this has happened three times. The first 18-24months were fine, a really friendly place. It's what endeared me to it. But 'we' got into the habit of occasionally being curt with one and other and it just escalates until, I'm sure, some people are posting just for a certain response or using subtleties to cause heat.

I do believe it will die off, as long as the majority of us can realise it's happening and back off a bit til it blows over. If there's no fuel, there's no fire.

 

[studders]

I find the constant whingeing, with a fair smattering of hypocrisy, from a tiny minority, as off putting as the inferred problems.

I can't say I'm overly worried about it though, even if some members are taking some time out - the latter is probably quite a healthy thing to do and really not the end of the world. This is just a forum.

Prezactly Right. It's just a Forum, albeit a good one, where views and counter views should be able to be freely expressed. Not one where a minority demands that things be done their way or not at all.

 

[Mike.C]

I find the constant whingeing, with a fair smattering of hypocrisy, from a tiny minority, as off putting as the inferred problems.

I can't say I'm overly worried about it though, even if some members are taking some time out - the latter is probably quite a healthy thing to do and really not the end of the world. This is just a forum.

Prezactly Right. It's just a Forum, albeit a good one, where views and counter views should be able to be freely expressed. Not one where a minority demands that things be done their way or not at all.

Spot on, but I think that if members are demanding for threads to be locked it is going to cause even more bad feeling. All it takes is one or two people who have taken a dislike to another member/s to wind things up on his/their thread/s and the thread is locked.
In the first place wouldn't it be better for the moderators to have a quite word with the trouble maker via pm, before drastic action is taken?

Cheers

Mike

 

[monkeybiter]

i'm a member of another forum on an unrelated subject which is populated in the majority by north Americans and moderated chiefly by an Englishman. There is a wealth of technical knowledge and experience but a severe dearth of good manners and general friendliness. Insults, racism and bigotry are quite common, even from the mod. It's lively and useful but not nice to visit.
I am a newbie to this forum but have been astounded by the welcome I was given, and the consistently friendly and good natured posts between all the regular contributors. Even though I'm short of time to make, I seem to find time to visit the forum every day.

 

[big soft moose]

and if you say anything contentious preface it with IMO (in my opinion) so you arent stating it as a fact - in my view the biggest reason for fallings out is people seeming to state that only their way/ view/opinion/ whatever is valid wheras in fact there are many different ways to approach nearly any task or argument.

 

[cornucopia]

I'm also backing off from this forum- i cant belive how much its changed since i joined

 

[woodbloke]

and if you say anything contentious preface it with IMO (in my opinion) so you arent stating it as a fact - in my view the biggest reason for fallings out is people seeming to state that only their way/ view/opinion/ whatever is valid wheras in fact there are many different ways to approach nearly any task or argument.

As has been said many times, t'interweb is a strange place regarding just how the meaning of dialogue in conveyed. As BSM correctly says there are plenty of ways to 'skin a cat' and not just the one definitive method, so the inclusion of 'IMO' should always be used to indicate that it's a personal viewpoint.
This was one of the irritating things about a certain cricketer who's just left the forum. The individual concerned was a goldmine of sound information but his forthright opinions on some handtools occasionally (not always) made me 'hackle' Notwithstanding that though, the forum is poorer for his loss...IMHO :wink: - Rob

 

[Karl]

so the inclusion of 'IMO' should always be used to indicate that it's a personal viewpoint.

But surely the fact that the poster has typed it shows that it is just his/her opinion. :duno:

If I say "The best way to sharpen plane blades is using an eclipse type jig, a trend double sided diamond stone and some honing compound rubbed onto a scrap of MDF", then that is clearly My Opinion. I don't see why we need to earmark it as such.

Perhaps we should end all posts with "other methods are available" :lol:

Cheers

Karl